Trade deadline major milestone on road to playoffs

Teams to watch

As the second half opens Tuesday night, here are three teams from each conference that could bear watching:

EASTERN CONFERENCE

Florida Panthers -- The Panthers started the 2009 portion of their season with one regulation loss in their first nine games (5-1-3), which allowed them to move within one point of an Eastern Conference playoff spot. Nine of their next 16 games are at home, including their first two coming out of the All-Star break.

"I believe the Panthers are a better team then what they've shown us this season," former Tampa Bay Lighting General Manager Jay Feaster told NHL.com. "I don't think some of their young players, the (Nathan) Hortons and (Stephen) Weisses, I'm not sure if they've yet figured out how good they need to be. They could very easily be a playoff team this year."

Carolina Hurricanes -- The Hurricanes start the second half of the season with a tenuous one-point lead on the Panthers for the final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference.

Coach Paul Maurice, who replaced Peter Laviolette behind the bench Dec. 3, has gone 11-9-3, which has included a four-game win streak and five-game losing streak.

The Hurricanes open with three games in four nights coming out of the break, but the final two are at home, against the Thrashers and Lightning. Then it's a three-game swing out West.

"It's either going to be really good or really bad," said Feaster. "Which Carolina team is going to show up post-All Star?"

Buffalo Sabres -- With seven wins in their last 10 games before the All-Star break, the Sabres shot up to seventh in the East.

Their last game before the midseason timeout, though, left Feaster puzzled. The Sabres fell behind 2-0 just 5:19 into the game and never recovered in a 5-3 loss in Tampa.

"They came into Tampa and I thought they were awful," said Feaster. "I thought they played a clunker of a game. It surprised me because here's a team that had been on such a great roll. I wonder what they're going to be in the second half."

WESTERN CONFERENCE

Phoenix Coyotes -- The Coyotes are one of the surprise teams in the League this season as they come out of the All-Star break fifth in the powerful Western Conference.

Led by All-Star Shane Doan and a rapidly maturing young nucleus, things are looking up in the desert. They play eight of their next 15 games at home, but have tough road games coming up in San Jose, Detroit and Dallas. And while they have a playoff spot today, they're only four points ahead of ninth-place Minnesota.

"I'm not sure they have enough to get there given the strength of the Western Conference," said Feaster. "The big thing there is if they continue to get the goaltending and their young kids realize they shouldn't be there. Your young players are inexperienced to the point that they don't put that extra pressure on themselves so they're almost innocent about it."

Columbus Blue Jackets -- The Blue Jackets are the only current team never to make the Stanley Cup Playoffs, but there's a chance that could change this season.

The Blue Jackets come out of the break just two points out of a playoff spot, and with stellar rookie goalie Steve Mason leading the League with a 2.05 goals-against average, things are looking up.

"Columbus intrigues me because Hitch (coach Ken Hitchcock) has them going and I really think they're going to try something in the trade market, maybe in a big splash kind of way," said Feaster. "I'm anxious to see what they do in the second half."

Minnesota Wild -- The Wild started the season strong, but have faded and today find themselves outside the playoff picture.

But with their style of play and strong netminding, plus nine of their next 13 games at home, things could change fast.

"I'm anxious to see what Minnesota does in the second half," said Feaster. "I think the goaltender (Niklas Backstrom) is a pretty special player."

-- Adam Kimelman

The celebration is over in Montreal, which means it's time to get back to work for the players on the 30 NHL teams. Games resume Tuesday, with the focus now shifting to the final 78 days of the regular season.

The road to the 2009 Stanley Cup Playoffs is not a smoothly paved one, and for the eight teams in each conference that avoid all the potholes, the prize is a chance to play for the greatest trophy in sports.

There is a major marker on that road, though -- the March 4 trade deadline. For general managers around the League, that's the next big thing with which they're concerned.

"From my perspective, now's the time you have to start thinking about what kind of moves you can make going into the deadline," said Jay Feaster, who spent more than six years as GM of the Tampa Bay Lightning. "You've already established what your needs are to be a serious contender in the playoffs or a team that gets into the playoffs. Now is a time you start to lay the groundwork for possible deals that happen at the deadline. That's the most important part of right now. Before you even look at the playoffs, I think you need to know what you're going to be able to do to help your team."

Feaster believes the buyer/seller aspect of the equation should be set for teams by now; now it's just a matter of getting teams to the table.

"Sometimes they're not going to deal with you in January," said Feaster, "they're going to wait right until the deadline comes."

In an ideal world, Feaster said a team would have acquired what it needed for a playoff push long before the final six weeks of the season. He pointed to his trade for defenseman Darryl Sydor on Jan. 27, 2004, a move which helped the Lightning win the 2004 Stanley Cup. Feaster believes bringing Sydor on board early allowed him to become a full-fledged member of the team and build all the bonds necessary with his new teammates.

One thing testing those bonds is the potential free agency status of a number of big-name players, including Panthers defenseman Jay Bouwmeester and two members of the Wild -- forward Marian Gaborik and goaltender Niklas Backstrom.

"In my mind that's something that I think the teams really need to be focused on in this new world that we live in," said Feaster. "You have to decide, 'Can I keep that player or can I lose him for nothing on July 1?'"

Feaster said part of the answer comes from a manager's relationship with ownership. In his case, the directive from his bosses in Tampa Bay was go for the playoffs every year, and we'll deal with players potentially leaving later.

"We always ran it hot," said Feaster. "We were more focused on, let's make the playoffs and the old bromide that once you're in, who knows. We would run it hot and then the season would end for us and then you start having those conversations. But you're so close to July 1, the player says, why not wait?"

Feaster did say that if he had it to do over again, he would have opted to move a few players he knew he wouldn't be able to re-sign, and used Pavel Kubina as an example. Kubina left the Lightning as a free agent after the 2005-06 season after the team went out in the first round of the playoffs. Instead of trading Kubina, the Lightning kept him and then watched as he signed with the Maple Leafs that summer.

"If we had said we're not winning the Stanley Cup in his unrestricted year, said let's move him, we would have restocked the shelves," said Feaster.

That question now falls on teams like the Panthers and Wild. Florida comes out of the break ninth in the Eastern Conference, but just one point out of its first playoff spot since the 1999-2000 season.

"Bouwmeester is the perfect example," said Feaster. "Do we keep him here, run it hot and hope we get into the playoffs? Or do we realistically believe that if we don't make the playoffs and don't do anything, this guy will leave and we'll get nothing?"

The comings and goings stop at 4 p.m. on March 4. Once a team gets past the deadline, Feaster says he shifts into "cheerleader mode," and leaves things to the coaches and players in the final run to -- hopefully -- the postseason.

"Your coaching staff is really trying to get the team playing like a playoff team," he said.

Feaster also shuts down the players from all non-hockey related enterprises.

"As management, you try to make it so all the players have to worry about it is playing," he said. "That's when we stop the visits … you start to cut the things off so all the players have to think about is hockey."

Feaster added that he also would meet with his professional scouting staff and start playoff scouting.

"Once the trade deadline passes, then you redeploy your pro guys," he said. "If the top two seeds are locked in and we're at 7 or 8, then after the deadline, we'll send those guys out and have a good read on possible playoff opponents."

The hope is those trips prove fruitful and help the playoff teams avoid any remaining potholes on the road to the Stanley Cup.

He's only 17 but he can see the ice so well and he moves the puck and goes to the open ice all the time, so I just think he's a player that is ready to play in the NHL. I'm really looking forward to coaching someone like this.

— U.S. National Junior Team coach Ron Wilson on Auston Matthews, the projected No. 1 pick of the 2016 NHL Draft